India made a winning start to their Commonwealth Games 2026 campaign after beating Malta in a tie-break in the women’s pairs lawn bowls event in Glasgow on Thursday. The experienced Indian pair of Rupa Rani Tirkey (lead) and Pinki (skip) fought off a strong challenge from Malta to win their Section B opener.
India took the first set 7-1, but Malta bounced back to win the second set 4-3 and force a tie-break. With the match on the line, the Indian pair kept their composure, and Pinki delivered the final bowl to seal the win and hand India their first victory of the campaign.
The result is another memorable moment for Indian lawn bowls, a sport that grabbed the country’s attention at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games in 2022. Tirkey and Pinki were part of the historic women’s fours team, along with Lovely Choubey and Nayanmoni Saikia, that won India’s first Commonwealth Games gold medal in the sport.
It was also India’s first appearance in the women’s fours final, and the victory turned lawn bowls into one of the biggest stories of the Games.
That gold medal came after a thrilling final against South Africa. India raced to a 7-2 lead after five ends before South Africa, one of the strongest teams in Commonwealth lawn bowls, fought back to level the scores at 8-8 after the 10th end and then moved 10-8 ahead in the 11th.
The Indian team responded well under pressure. Tirkey and Saikia played several important bowls, while Pinki and Choubey also made key contributions as India scored nine unanswered points over the final four ends, from the 12th to the 15th, to complete a famous comeback and create history.
Tirkey’s journey to the top has been one of hard work. She first played kabaddi before switching to lawn bowls. Both her father and later her mother worked in the postal department. Like many Indian lawn bowlers, she often used prize money from international medals to help pay for future overseas tours, as players regularly had to cover part of their travel costs. Her sister, Reema Rani Tirkey, is a cricketer.
Pinki’s journey into the sport began by chance. She studied at a school in Delhi that had one of only two lawn bowls greens and training centres in the city. What started as a hobby in 2007 soon turned into an international career, ending with the historic Commonwealth Games gold medal in Birmingham.
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